After the death of the tyrant, Chernobog, or Motso, as his friends called him, Daimonion wandered for a week through the vast underground kingdom, talking to various people. One day he went to an elderly woman and asked her for a favor:

“Could you care to feed an ordinary vagrant?”

“What do you think I am - some kind of fiend or what? Of course, dear, come in, please.”

Daimonion entered the small wooden house, lit only by the light of a small candle, standing on a table in the middle of the room. The woman went to the chest and pulled out some bread and handed it to him.

"Did you hear? Chernobog died."

"Gods don't die. You, my dear, apparently heard a lie."

"What are Gods doing then?"

"Gods live forever in our hearts. And protect us from all the troubles."

Daimonion bit off his bread bit by bit and stared at the mistress of the house.

"Where are your children?"

“They went to work in another city.”

“Do they often come back to visit you?”

“Once a week.”

Daimonion had already eaten half of the bread. Then he took a couple of apples out of the basket and offered them to the old woman.

"Would you like some?"

"I don't want anyone else's food.”

Daimonion nodded and put the apples back.

"Were you born here?"

“No. God has not been so merciful to me. I came here three decades ago. Before that, we lived on the other side. A shaman came to our village and told us that somewhere to the West of us, there is a cave where the Gods live. That's when my husband and I came here.”

“Do you like living here?”

“Yes. There are opportunities in this realm that our settlement didn't have. We were in search of happiness. Outside, all my childhood, I lived in a small wooden hut, my parents and I would cuddle together just to survive the winter, the walls did nothing to stop the cold winds from getting inside our small hut. I lived in a world of sickness and death, but this was not a fate I could wish for my children. When we arrived here, of course, we didn't even have a house, but there were prospects. For example, my husband found out that a castle was being built. Those who will take part in its construction will get a tiny shack in the capital. How could you possibly refuse that? And the children grew by the minute. They needed shelter and food. My husband went to build the castle, and I went to various part-time jobs for a daily fee, mainly as a loader, carrying cans of water to give a drink to the builders, or carrying various food that the hunters got. To be honest, I stole a little of that food so that my children got more. It was just that there was very little money. It's okay for me to have a snack once a day, but the kids need to grow up. I think you understand.”

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

“Yes. I understand.”

“Well. We lived in a small house where all the builders lived. There were seven or more of us in one room. I don't remember much, to be honest. Oh yes, and I didn't really care about the others. When the castle was finished, we were given a shack. But the kids have grown up, they needed to live separately, start their own families. We gave them the house, so I and my husband continued to live with the builders. We knew that some other menial work will appear. And so it happened. They began to equip the entire settlement. My husband and I worked together. He was a good guy. He loved me very much. Truly. For example, if he would see me carrying a heavy bar or something, he would immediately run up, and take it from me. Once I was sent for a week to another city along a small group, the work was good and paid well. He took me to the assembly point. Then we said our good-byes, and he went back home, but I guess he smelled it was going to be cold, and I didn't even put on my kukhlyanka. So he ran three versts to the house, took the kukhlyanka, and brought it back to me. Exactly in time. He loved everyone, both children and people around him. No one has ever said a bad word about him in their entire life. And he died in his sleep, quietly and peacefully. We were planning to go to the store that day"- here the woman started to have some tears in her eyes, she quietly sobbed - "it was a very hard time for me. That's how I lived my whole life for the sake of my children. I just moved here with my husband a couple of years ago. And now I'm sitting by myself and wondering if I did the right thing or not. The best years are gone…”

The Daimonion nodded; finished his bread.

“Thank you for your story and for the bread. You are a good woman. Not everyone lets a stranger in to break bread with them. Bread after all, not only gives strength, but also imposes some obligations. So this thing is not as simple as it seems. And it's not easy to thank for it. Is there anything I can do for you?”

“No, thank you, dear, I do not need anything.”

“Then I'll go.”

“Will you stay overnight?”

“Here every day is a night.”

The woman smiled and laughed slightly.

“That's true. Well, good luck!”

The next day, Daimonion returned to the palace. The guards were still there, but they didn’t let him inside.

“Gentlemen, I don’t want to seem strange, but…” he began to speak in a whisper, bringing his hand to his mouth, “your ruler is dead. You are free. You can do whatever you want.”

Guards were silent.

“Why won't you let me in?”

Then the tallest said:

“Order.”

“Whose order? A dead man in a glass coffin?”

“Order to let only Ötzi in.”

“Well, okay.”

Daimonion raised his hand with outstretched palm to his head, saluted, and left.

For several more days, he told the residents about the death of the ruler, but most of them didn’t believe it, but some of them, a smallest part, Daimonion managed to convince. Then they decided to leave this place and live in the middle of the nature.

Daimonion went to various cave cities and saw how the locals turned to look at him. Everyone was lean, ragged, and hungry. Almost everyone smelled of death and decay. He said that they are free, that they can go back to nature, to themselves, to hunt and live as they want, but they are either afraid of the wrath of the ruler, or something else, in other words, they did not dare to change something. They looked at him as if he were a wandering alien or a dangerous predator they were seeing for the first time. In his appearance, they saw the life they envied, because he was neither thin nor exhausted by various kinds of suffering. It seemed to Daimonion that some of them even wanted to attack him with the intention of killing him and taking the apples, but at the last moment they did not dare to do so.

"That's what tyrant power does to people. Damn. They follow his laws even after death.”

Daimonion made a clap and time stopped. The passing residents suddenly froze. He headed for the exit, followed the signs through several tunnels, then emerged from a crevice twice the height of a man and turned around. His eyes shone with a white flame. A strong wind blew and icy snow fell. But he did not feel any of it, as if he were nature itself; blizzard, wind, cold, heat, rain, or hail – he was all of it. But Pelleas no longer saw this in the sphere's memories, he began to guess that something was wrong with this rascal. It angered him that he had lied to Motso, that he had set him up, and how he could have known about Alaval and Pelleas himself. But more importantly, Pelleas didn't see Daimonion collapse the entire cavern, killing every inhabitant who remained there with a single wave of his hand, like the horseman of the Apocalypse bringing death and destruction.